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Rejecting Christianity for Christ

There are many people that don’t reject Christ. What they do reject is Christianity. I’ve had more people than ever within the last year say to me, “I like God, I just don’t like the church.” God to them represents someone they find rather attractive. Christianity represents something that they find very unattractive.

In interacting with people about the subject, I often mention several things. One is you must always understand that Christ saves flawed, sinful people. There are those who come to Christ, and it must be realized that they are still sinners. That’s not an excuse; it’s an explanation. Even though they should attempt to live for Christ, we must realize it’s sinners God saves, and it’s sinners we remain. We’re going to make mistakes and do things that are shameful, and we’ll not always be the best representatives of Christianity.

Secondly, it’s imperative for that reason that in examining Christianity, you examine it through Christ—not through Christians. He is perfect even though Christians are imperfect. If you put your eyes on Christians, you’ll be often disappointed. If you keep your eyes on Christ, you’ll never be disappointed.

Thirdly, it’s important to remember that it’s not simply coming to Christ that makes the difference in a person’s life, but it’s living close to Him. If someone comes to Him but doesn’t live close to Him, sometimes their lives are not a whole lot different than many non-Christians. It’s interesting that in my more than 37 years of ministry, I’ve not met one person who met someone really seeking to live close to Christ in a biblical sense of the word that ever turned non-Christians off.

Finally, ask yourself the question, If you were Satan, how would you keep a person from coming to Christ? One way would be to depress them with Christianity so they never see Christ. Today, Satan is working in a big way in that area, and unfortunately, he has a lot of “Christians” to use—ones that are not living the life. Be forewarned that it can be a tactic of his to cause people to so reject Christians and Christianity that they never examine Christ.